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chapter twenty

Providence Station

Transverse, non-congruent


Klaus-Wilhelm stormed into CHRONO Operations, took a quick measure of the place, and strode toward the massive map of Providence now dominating the room’s center. Andover-Chen and Hinnerkopf stood at the diagram’s base, and numerous members from their support staffs now took up the first ring of workstations. Detective Cho and Agent Cantrell were also in attendance, along with a specialist in a Themis Division uniform, all three crowded around their own desks, studying what might have been drone visual feeds.

Klaus-Wilhelm came up beside Andover-Chen.

“What’s the situation, Doctor?”

“Ah, Commissioner.” Andover-Chen finished tapping a set of commands into a drone control interface. “Good timing. We’ve confirmed that at least some of Detective Cho’s suspicions are correct. The data packet sent by the Institute operative to Scaffold Delta does indeed appear to have been a decoy, with the true message breaking off along the way.”

“How did we miss something that big?”

“The second message was well disguised, masquerading as a routine status update between adjoining nodes. Our agents barely caught it the second time, and only thanks to a bit of technical insight from our Themis Division colleagues. Once the message was clear of the original, a secondary program executed, unpacking its contents and sending them worming through our systems. The trail ends at a node two levels above the station’s reactors. We believe the message contained instructions which were then transmitted locally to our missing conveyor drone.”

“How much of a head start does the drone have on us?”

“About eighty-five minutes, sir.”

“And what actions are we taking?”

“We’re running full self-diagnostics on each of our six reactors. Additionally, all available agents and drones have been mobilized to visually inspect the power plants and supporting systems, with priority given to our three hot singularity reactors and their exotic matter shells.”

“What do the diagnostics say?”

“That there’s nothing to worry about, but Hinnerkopf and I agree we shouldn’t trust those results. Not with the digital sleight of hand we’ve witnessed so far. Hence the visual inspections.”

“Can we even trust our own drones at this point?” Klaus-Wilhelm asked. “The Institute’s been playing our systems like a goddamned fiddle.”

“We’re doing what we can to mitigate that risk.”

“How?”

“We’re pairing DTI and Gordian drones where we can,” Hinnerkopf said, stepping away from her own screens. “And ensuring each team has at least two physical agents.”

“Doctor Hinnerkopf managed to free up their entire drone inventory from the docked DTI ships,” Andover-Chen said.

Klaus-Wilhelm gave her a curt nod. “We appreciate the prompt support. Did Muntero give you any problems?”

“No, Commissioner.” The slightest hint of a wry smile graced Hinnerkopf’s lips. “It seems our consul doesn’t relish the idea of being blown to bits either.”

“I should hope not,” Klaus-Wilhelm replied dryly, though he wouldn’t put anything past Muntero’s pigheaded “risk management” at this point.

He’d half expected the DTI chronoports to flee the station like rats from a sinking ship—on Muntero’s orders, of course—but instead they were standing their ground, assisting his agents any way they could through yet another crisis. His eyes skimmed over occupied workstations and found more than a few examples of Gordian and DTI agents standing or sitting beside one another, sometimes with one craning over the shoulder of the other.

He picked out a few stressed or nervous faces amongst the staff—on both sides—but everyone was acting like this was just another problem that needed solving, so they might as well hunker down and get it done.

That’s one of the things he’d grown to appreciate about the DTI, despite his traumatic first encounter with the organization. He doubted he’d ever like them—not with those dark, flame-scorched memories tucked away in his heart—but he could recognize and respect a well-staffed, well-managed group of people when he saw it.

And that’s exactly what the DTI was. They were relentless professionals in pursuit of whatever goal was placed in front of them. He might not always share their goals, but he couldn’t deny the efficiency and determination on display.

And they had no problem sitting side-by-side with Gordian agents in order to get the job done.

We really are making this work, aren’t we? he reflected. Now if we can just avoid the whole station going nova.

“Doctor!” a Gordian agent called out. “We have something from Team Four! Passing the image to you now.”

“Then let’s take a look,” Andover-Chen murmured as a new screen opened over his virtual console. The image featured the swell of a massive sphere protruding down through a ceiling of thick structural members and cluttered utility channels. A trio of light beams danced across a black surface segmented by thin green gridlines and marked with a prominent SourceCode logo. A second screen opened with a high-definition thermal breakdown of the area, revealing the exterior to be uniformly cool except for an ugly, oblong patch that glowed angrily.

“Is that hot zone normal?” Klaus-Wilhelm asked.

“No, it’s not,” Andover-Chen replied quietly. “The shell’s temperature should be much more uniform. This sort of exotic matter has a very high thermal capacity, so we shouldn’t be seeing this much of a temperature difference. If I were to guess, I’d say something on the surface is producing waste heat.”

Andover-Chen assumed control of Team Four’s small, elliptical maintenance drone and guided it forward, past two crouched Gordian Agents and a DTI Wolverine. The drone slowed to a halt beside the warmest spot on the surface and extended a prog-steel pseudopod.

It had almost reached the surface when the cables in an overhead utility trough shifted aside.

The bulk of a CounterGravCorp conveyor pushed through the cables and dove at the maintenance drone.

“Whoa!” Andover-Chen exclaimed, his hands jerking over the controls, pulling his drone back.

The conveyor reached out with its manipulator arms, snatched the smaller drone out of the air, and began to squeeze. Warning lights flashed on the screen as the maintenance drone’s body began to crumple under the pressure.

Klaus-Wilhelm reached around Andover-Chen and flicked on a live channel to Team Four.

“Agents, this is the Commissioner. Take that drone out, but do not hit the reactor!”

“Sir!”

The view shook as pistol fire punched the conveyor from the side, knocking it back and sending it into a lazy pirouette. More gunfire rattled off, and this time the Wolverine joined in, peppering the conveyor with finger-sized holes. The conveyor’s grip loosened, and Andover-Chen managed to squirm his drone out of its grasp.

The rogue conveyor sputtered drunkenly under the onslaught, then dropped to the floor and skidded to a screeching halt.

Two Gordian agents stepped forward and inspected their handiwork.

“Drone down, sir.”

“Good work,” Klaus-Wilhelm replied. “Sweep the area for any more surprises.”

“Yes, sir.”

Klaus-Wilhelm clicked the mute. “How’s your drone?”

“Good enough,” Andover-Chen said, guiding it forward once more. “The frame is warped, and there’s a flutter in the thruster, but that’s it. I can still use it to grab a sample from the reactor.”

“Then proceed.”

“Yes, sir. Here’s goes.”

The drone extended a prog-steel pseudopod and scraped it against the reactor’s surface. Prog-steel encapsulated the sample, and the drone brought it before a small internal scope for testing and analysis.

An alarm screen opened, and Hinnerkopf stepped over. “That’s stuff’s already eating the drone from the inside out.”

“Nanotech corrosion,” Andover-Chen said. “A very nasty, very infectious strain, too. We’ll need to isolate and destroy the drone.”

“And the reactor?” Klaus-Wilhelm asked.

“The corrosion is eating through the outer shell. Nanotech isn’t very good at working with exotic matter, which is probably the only reason we’re still alive to talk about it. However, unless we do something about it, the reactor will reach a critical imbalance and collapse in on itself, given enough time. The pseudo-singularity in the core will cancel out the negative matter shell, and the imbalance will be released as pure energy. Explosively, I might add.”

“How do we fix it?”

Andover-Chen turned to him with what might have been the most serious expression he’d ever seen from the scientist.

“Very, very carefully, sir.”

* * *

Isaac never enjoyed presenting in front of an audience. Any assignment that placed him before a crowd had terrified him throughout his school years, and while SysPol Academy had whipped his tendency toward cold-sweating fear into a begrudging “let’s just get this over with,” he preferred to avoid such tasks wherever possible.

Conveniently, his job kept him busy in the field, and in those rare occasions where he had to testify at a trial or present a report to coworkers or superiors, he always received ample time to prepare, venturing in only when armed and armored with solid facts and legal conclusions on his side.

This was not one of those moments.

But when Commissioner Klaus-Wilhelm von Schröder told someone to summarize his findings and present them to senior staff in half an hour, the man was unlikely to entertain excuses.

And so Isaac, Susan, and Cephalie had gone to work, slapping together the best presentation they could in the time allotted. Omar Raviv—Isaac’s mentor back when he’d been an acting deputy detective—had once impressed upon him that the higher up in management a report needed to go, the more dumbed down the summary should be.

That wasn’t a knock against the intelligence of SysPol’s upper echelons. Far from it, in fact. Rather, Raviv’s point was people in those positions were under constant data bombardment, to the point of information overload, so if he or Isaac needed to make a point, best make it as easy to digest as possible.

Which, in turn, had led to a lot of large font and bright colors being used in this report. Isaac cringed a little on the inside as he advanced to the next screen. The timeline for Reality Flux, Charm Quark, and Scaffold Delta looked like something from an elementary school art class, complete with bold text and huge swathes of primary colors.

“Which brings us to information gleaned from the hijacking of Reality Flux,” Isaac continued, highlighting a portion of the timeline. “Video of the theft provides the start of our best estimate for Scaffold Delta’s illegal venture into the transverse. The SourceCode vessel’s destruction provides the stopping point. With this window and the scaffold’s top transdimensional speed, we can then construct an absolute maximum sphere within which the Institute base may be located. The—”

“What about the time it took Delta to slip away at reduced speed?” Klaus-Wilhelm interrupted. “Or the time needed for whatever branch universe to form and catch up with the True Present? Are those factored into your search sphere?”

Isaac regarded the room’s occupants and did his best to suppress a frown while Susan stood stiffly beside him. In addition to the Commissioner, both CHRONO consuls were in attendance along with Directors Jonas and Csaba Shigeki—the latter still in his temporary body—and Doctors Andover-Chen and Hinnerkopf. He could almost feel their collective eyes boring into his skull.

“No, sir,” Isaac replied, his voice firm but respectful. “Regrettably, we haven’t had the opportunity yet to consult with our Gordian colleagues on those sorts of technical questions.”

We only had half an hour to throw this together! he screamed in his head. What do you expect from us?!

“I’ve already put together estimates for both points,” Andover-Chen said, leaning forward at the conference table. “It won’t take me long to adjust the estimate.”

“It’s already smaller than the area we’re searching now,” Peng added. “We’ll be able to fine-tune our search patterns as ships come back into communication range with their reports. The fact that the storm’s easing up will also make this task easier.”

Klaus-Wilhelm merely nodded in response, his face unreadable.

“Continue with your presentation, Detective.”

“Yes, sir. Getting back to Scaffold Delta . . . ”

Isaac summarized what they knew of the scaffold’s activities, all the way up to fake-Creed’s capture. His audience continued to pepper him with questions, and he did his best to field them, eventually moving on to their assessment of the Institute.

“While it’s difficult for us to make any firm statements regarding the Institute, they have shown a strong anti-Admin mindset thus far. The bomb is the most clearcut example of this, since it specifically targeted Director Shigeki and his senior staff. Overall, our read on the Institute is that it’s ambivalent toward SysGov casualties.”

“But they almost blew up the station,” Peng said. “That’s a little more than ‘ambivalent.’”

“Correct, sir. However, the sabotage uncovered at Reactor Three was clearly initiated by the operative’s last transmission, and not before. Given the operative had numerous opportunities to trigger it beforehand—coupled with his animus toward the Admin—we’re left with something of a contradiction. Destroying the station would have easily resulted in the highest Admin death toll. It would have also heavily disrupted our search for the Institute’s base, but it wasn’t triggered except as a last resort. Something clearly stayed the operative’s hand.”

“And you believe that something was SysGov casualties?” Klaus-Wilhelm asked.

“Yes, sir.”

“What changed his mind?”

“It’s hard to say without more information.”

“Then what are your next steps?”

“Our most promising lead is Doctor Xenophon and any ties he may have to the Institute. We also have a set of coordinates on Luna used by Delta for connectome transmission. As long as there are no objections, we intend to return to SysGov as soon as possible to pursue these leads.”

“What do we know about this Xenophon character?” Peng asked.

“Just the basics until we can access his public record back in SysGov. He’s a professor of abstraction at Luna’s West Cognitum University. Recently, he was invited as part of the Million Handshake Initiative to guest-lecture in the Admin. However, most of his appearances were cancelled due to his intense anti-Admin rhetoric.”

Muntero snorted.

“In short, we kicked the troublemaker out.”

“Differences in opinion can be such a terrible thing,” Peng muttered under his breath.

Muntero scowled at her fellow consul.

“Sorry,” Peng said. “Force of habit.”

Muntero looked ready to launch a sharp counter-remark, but then huffed out a breath and turned to Isaac.

“Detective, do you believe the Institute is behind the recent terror strikes in the Admin?”

“That’s one possibility, Madam Consul. Certainly, the Institute has demonstrated the necessary sophistication, especially when it comes to their software, to carry out such activities, either directly or through proxies. The presence of an independent industrial base—possibly a very large one—further aligns their capabilities with what we know. However, we lack direct evidence to prove a connection.”

“But what do you believe?”

“I believe what I can prove,” Isaac replied. He wasn’t about to voice his impromptu guesswork in front of this crowd! “Right now, all I can say is it remains a possibility.”

“Very well. I can respect that approach.” Muntero turned to Susan. “What about you, Agent? What’s your take on all this?”

Susan hesitated with a brief, panicked look in her eyes, perhaps taken aback by suddenly being called on. She recovered quickly, wrapping herself in the calm veneer of a model Peacekeeper.

“I concur with Detective Cho’s assessment.”

Muntero waited for more, but when none came she began tapping her fingers on the table.

“And?” she prompted at last.

“I recommend we follow his . . . recommendations for our next course of action.”

A new, expectant silence fell over the room. Muntero glanced over to either side, as if inviting the other attendees to ask their own questions.

After a moment, Klaus-Wilhelm leaned forward.

“Have you come across any evidence of additional Institute agents operating in or around Providence Station?”

“No, sir,” Isaac replied. “Everything we’ve uncovered so far can be traced back to the replacements for Agents Vidali and Creed. Of course, that doesn’t mean they’re not here.”

“Point taken, Detective. I think we’ve all come to respect the Institute’s capabilities. Do you have anything else to add to your report?”

“No, sir. Not at this time.”

“Then I thank you and your team for the update. You may return to your duties.”

* * *

Susan let out a relieved sigh once she and Isaac were alone again, meeting up in a side passage off from CHRONO Operations.

“I hate getting called on like that.”

“You and me both.” Isaac gave her a quick smile. “At least you didn’t have to present.”

“Too true. Thanks for handling that, by the way.”

“No problem.” He raised his palm and opened a comm window. The recipient took only a few seconds to answer.

“Elifritz here. Go ahead, Detective.”

“Captain, we find ourselves once again in need of your services. Are you free to transport us to SysGov’s Luna?”

“I’m afraid not. All chronoports on or near Providence have been ordered to muster up near the station and keep their impellers hot. I’m guessing we’ll be joining the search for the Institute’s base; our superiors only need some time to sort out who goes where.”

“I see. Is there any chance you could give us a lift while you wait?”

“Not without orders from the top. Sorry. You could try talking to Acting Director Shigeki, though you may have better luck going straight to Gordian. A few of their TTVs have started trickling back in.”

“Understood. We’ll ask around and see what our options are. Thank you again, Captain.”

He closed the comm window.

“Should we talk to Schröder about this?” Susan asked.

“Uh, no,” Isaac replied firmly. “We don’t need to bother a SysPol commissioner over our travel plans. Cephalie?”

The LENS hovered over, and Cephalie appeared atop it.

“You rang?”

“Check in with Operations and see if you can rustle up a ride for us.”

“Sure thing.” She waved and then vanished.

“Wonder how long we’ll have to wait.” Susan folded her arms and leaned against the wall. “Is Gilbert coming with us?”

“No, he and Kikazaru are staying until they finish sifting through Scaffold Delta’s systems. Gilbert thinks they caught the real prize with those lunar coordinates, but there’s always the chance a slower, more thorough sweep will turn up something else.”

“Then you and I are on our own again?”

“Looks that way. Hopefully someone can drop us off at Argus Station soon. Once we’re there, we’ll requisition a V-wing and fly over to Luna.”

“Sounds like a plan to me.”

Cephalie materialized atop the LENS. “I’m back, and I have good news! We’ve got six TTVs stopping by over the next two hours, and more on the way soon after. Care to guess which one is getting here first?”

“Do I have to?” Isaac asked.

“Come on. Give it a try.”

“Well, since I only know the one ship . . . ”



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